


Danny Mahealani: Dryad of the Meliai

by Onlymystory



Series: The Call of the Pack [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Danny Mahealani Knows, Dryads - Freeform, Gen, Interlude
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-17
Updated: 2014-12-17
Packaged: 2018-03-01 21:41:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2788715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Onlymystory/pseuds/Onlymystory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Talia Hale takes power as alpha of Beacon Hills, Danny Mahealani is 344 years old. A Meliai dryad, he lives as a spirit of the ash tree, and since ash trees are populous across most of the world, he’s seen many things in his life. Despite the legends that most often equate his people with old mythologies, the spirits of nature have lived on earth since its inception. Danny’s people moved about across the world, until the splitting of the Pangaea forced most to settle into a home. To a point at least. And so Danny’s particular family found themselves drawn to a forest in the West, one with rich energy and ley lines that didn’t lose their power, even as the humans of the world found less reason to believe in magic.</p><p>Over the years, Danny’s home became known by many names, until he identified as a Meliai dryad of Beacon Hills, a small town in northern California.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Danny Mahealani: Dryad of the Meliai

**Author's Note:**

> If you haven't read the first part in this series, you will have no idea what the fuck is going on. 
> 
> FYI, I’m fully aware that traditionally dryads are female tree spirits. But um, I do what I want and I wanted Danny to be a dryad. Meliai are ash tree dryads. Yes, this distinction matters. No, I wasn't subtle or clever about it.

When Talia Hale takes power as alpha of Beacon Hills, Danny Mahealani is 344 years old. A Meliai dryad, he lives as a spirit of the ash tree, and since ash trees are populous across most of the world, he’s seen many things in his life. Despite the legends that most often equate his people with old mythologies, the spirits of nature have lived on earth since its inception. Danny’s people moved about across the world, until the splitting of the Pangaea forced most to settle into a home. To a point at least. And so Danny’s particular family found themselves drawn to a forest in the West, one with rich energy and ley lines that didn’t lose their power, even as the humans of the world found less reason to believe in magic.

Over the years, Danny’s home became known by many names, until he identified as a Meliai dryad of Beacon Hills, a small town in northern California.

There was a change in the wind the day Talia Hale took power. She was a formidable alpha already, with immense support from other alphas and magical folk in the region. Like most shifters, she had respect for the earth and the moon without knowing about Danny and his people. Danny had seen many things over the years, many leaders come and go, and he’d even taken the occasional human form when he couldn’t resist his curiousity.

But now, there was something more in the air. A sense of foreboding and a sense of anticipation were both there and yet Danny felt the story he wanted to witness wasn’t Talia’s but that of the little boy who held her hand as she completed the alpha rituals under a full moon. The story of Derek Hale.

Danny makes the choice then to take a more permanent human form. Dryads don’t suffer from any such elvish nonsense of giving up immortality to humans. But he doesn’t want to observe this story, he wants to participate, and so he seeks out the best way to enter the story.

The thing is, while the Hale story intrigues him, there are several pregnant women in Beacon Hills at this time and the threads of their children’s spirits already reach out to each other. Whatever is meant to happen, the fates have already set in motion.

So Danny Mahealani becomes a seedling, a baby of only a few months. He’s unaware of his dryad nature for the first few years of life, behaving as a normal child. It’s when he’s six that the memories of his dryad nature return. They don’t startle him, rather coming back in comfort, like a favorite toy he’d set aside for a little while.

This is the nature of dryads who take human form from the beginning. They experience humanity in its purest form and then, as the harsh realities of the world begin to present themselves, the wisdom of the Meliai return to them.

And so Danny grows up in two worlds. His parents, also dryads who listened to his pleas early on and agreed to help him, make sure he doesn’t lose his connection to the trees. Once he’s older, he can go back and forth on his own. The rest of his world consists Stiles Stilinski, Scott McCall, Lydia Martin, Jackson Whittemore, and Derek Hale.

He’s frustrated at times of course. The natural course of human nature mean petty differences and schoolyard fights establish certain cliques. To fit in, to not draw unwanted attention from outside forces, Danny has to play the game, and thus he can’t be as active a participant as he wants.

All the wisdom in the world can’t always compete with the human emotions and so its on a night when Jackson is crying in Danny’s arms because he’s adopted, insisting that his birth parents didn’t want him and someday his adoptive parents won’t either, that a fire sweeps through the Hale house. Lydia and Jackson are playing board games with Danny the day Claudia Stilinski dies, and while Danny notices a shudder in Stiles’ spirit, he’s mostly caught up in the competition.

Sure he notices things, the way Scott gathers people to him, the way Stiles is homeschooled and gone from Beacon Hills quite a bit, the way Jackson craves family yet spurns the one offered him. But other things slip to the wayside.

And so the threads of their lives grow and tangle and unravel in turn, until if Danny were to search them, he would find occasional knots where they came together, but mostly several people headed in completely different directions.

It’s when Derek Hale returns to Beacon Hills, after six years running, that Danny senses a change. The spirits he’s been watching start to fall along the same path of fate and Danny knows that the story he’s been waiting for begins to write its first few pages.

~

As the world of his friends turns upside down, Danny lives his life on the outskirts, waiting for a sign he’s supposed to get involved.

He sees possibility when Stiles uses druidic magic to try speaking to the trees. The magic has a flavor of antiquity to it, not surprising considering Stiles’ ancestry, but something holds Danny back. He answers Stiles’ call, encouraging his fellow dryads to talk back at least a little, but nothing further.

It’s when Lydia awakens the Nemeton with the power of a banshee’s cry that Danny knows his time has come.

The trees of Beacon Hills are awake, they are alert, and they are no longer passive observers in the story. The pull of this land on the dryads spirits all those centuries ago becomes clear. Danny’s purpose, his very existence, has been created for this story.

**Author's Note:**

> I know it's short, but hey look at me go! (PS, I realize its kind of ridiculous to get excited at myself for posting stuff, since I'm the reason I fall behind, but when I'm on track and in the writing zone, I get pretty proud). Okay so important stuff. Obviously there are more questions about Danny. Like what are his powers, what's this story going to be, why wouldn't all the stuff that already happened be something he would get involved in? I'm playing a long game there though, so these questions will be answered over time.  
> The next bit will be back to chapters, Sterek centric, and featuring the entire pack.


End file.
